And:
Is it too tall and heavy to be useful as a performance vehicle?
How much range do you lose by adding sticky tires?
Will anyone be making suspension upgrades for it?
How do they end up saying that a full charge is equivalent to 1.8 gallons of gas? That sounds wacked.
I would love to see some performance hybrid and/or EV projects from GRM, Bolt or otherwise.
Apparently you can pick up a Fiat 500e EV for about $4500 at auction, which gives me all sorts of fun ideas.
pointofdeparture wrote: I would love to see some performance hybrid and/or EV projects from GRM, Bolt or otherwise. Apparently you can pick up a Fiat 500e EV for about $4500 at auction, which gives me all sorts of fun ideas.
Agreed. I've heard that 1st gen Volts are an excellent value right now, and although not a performance car, 273 ft./lbs of torque should be good for something. Hmmm, tow vehicle!
JG had a Volt a couple years back, but he hit the incentivized lease deal--which made tons of financial sense for him, but killed any project-car potential for us. One of these is still on our radar.
Margie
I would SO love to have a Bolt. Had a Leaf years back and thoroughly enjoyed it. Even had my current house built with 220 in the garage specifically for an EV. However, my commute is 60 miles each way and the Leaf can't go that far (no charging options at work). I'd look into leasing the Bolt, but the mileage costs would push it out of the range of being sensible.
EV is definitely on my must own list, thought I'd start w/ the Volt but the Bolt looks more promising now.
So, what to sell/ trade in? E92 or S197, love 'em both. 
Can't keep 'em all.
There was a guy who used to autocross his 1st gen Insight in our region. I'm not sure what if anything he did to the suspension, but he'd show up at the track in what looked like a bone stock car, whip out the jack and Hoosier slicks and go out there to post very competitive times. It's been a long time, but seem to recall that he was faster than many if not most of the Miatas.
It's the wave of the future. I was really surprised at how many GRMers admitted to being Prius fanbois in a recent thread. Get on it!
pointofdeparture wrote: Apparently you can pick up a Fiat 500e EV for about $4500 at auction, which gives me all sorts of fun ideas.
It's a shame that the same car gets turned around and sold at the lot for 12 grand - which makes me want to get a dealers license. I have an aquaintance who has a side business specializing in Toyota pickups. He gets them at auctions, spiffs them up and sells them to latino contractors. He also owns a bunch of commercial real estate which tells me that the truck flipping must be very lucrative or very fun to be worth his time.
None of the EVs I've driven (Leaf, Soul, Focus) really lent themselves to performance driving: they suffer from numb steering, terminal understeer, and electronically limited off-the-line torque. Have any of the early reviews suggested otherwise of the Bolt?
PS - Do any of you guys have driving impressions of the BMW i3?
nderwater wrote: None of the EVs I've driven (Leaf, Soul, Focus) really lent themselves to performance driving: they suffer from numb steering, terminal understeer, and electronically limited off-the-line torque. Have any of the early reviews suggested otherwise of the Bolt? PS - Do any of you guys have driving impressions of the BMW i3?
My impressions of the 3 days I had with an i3 is that it's the BMW of EVs, in a good way. Build quality is nice, and no cooling system to break down on you... 
Agile (even with it's weird skinny tires) due to the RWD, low weight, and low CG (CF chassis with low mounted batteries will do that). None of them have huge off the line jump (with one exception, more on that in a moment) but the 10-50mph jump is impressive. Just punch it and it goes, no waiting. Fun for zipping around in town with. It was even fairly quick from 60-80 on the highway, but 80 is about all I'd go in one. The Volt was much more stable up to it's 100 mph top end.
The exception I was talking about (not a Tesla s, those are in a different price range) was the Spark EV. Almost 350 lb ft of torque (the originals were rated at 400 lb ft) it jumps pretty nicely and can light up the tires and has a bit of "fun" torque steer when punched at like 5 mph. It really scoots and is a blast to drive. I'd have one in a... heartbeat.
Meh. I'd read the articles, but this isn't really up my alley. I think the performance potential is too low, and there is no new car that I consider GRM. Modding a new car doesn't seem grassroots to me either. But different strokes and all...
So what are all the other off lease electrics going for at auction?
I'm surprised they don't have a tune for more acceleration from a stop. Our hybrid buses a straight electric drive and when we first got them they had to be detuned because they accelerated much harder than a diesel and you could drive out from under a standing load of customers if they weren't holding on good.
In reply to Wall-e:
I'm surprised too. The Leaf limits torque pretty severely on initial acceleration. Apparently Nismo offered a tune in Japan but it was JDM only and no way to get our hands on it stateside.
You can get a VERY low mileage used Leaf for under $8000 and probably less at auction.
It is NOT a performance car. Acceleration is fine but it wallows and understeers like a pig.
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